A complete video of the Award Ceremony of the Medal of Honor to Captain Swenson is posted at WashingtonPost.com.
In this video, President Obama describes actions by "Will Swenson" at a distance of 50 meters, and actions by Will at a distance of 20 or 30 meters. The "official citation" for the Award states *no* distances, in meters or in any other unit of distance. Why did Obama's account included statements of distances in meters, but the official citation gave *no* distances? Both accounts probably originated somewhere in the Department of Defense. Eugene Mechtly ________________________________________ From: Paul Trusten [[email protected]] Sent: Wednesday, October 16, 2013 4:11 PM Cc: U.S. Metric Association; mechtly, eugene a Subject: Re: [USMA:53328] Ceremony in Meters I think the President may have been simply reading a text prepared for him by the Defense Department, but I guess we can give him credit for not back-converting. Paul Trusten, Registered Pharmacist Vice President and Public Relations Director U.S. Metric Association, Inc. Midland, Texas, USA +1(432)528-7724 www.metric.org [email protected] > On Oct 15, 2013, at 16:09, "mechtly, eugene a" <[email protected]> wrote: > > Today, Captain William D. Swenson was awarded the Medal of Honor. > > In describing Will's heroic actions under fire, President Obama used the word > "meters" several times, with *no conversions* to any units of distance > outside the SI. > > Of course, as we all know, US military personnel already speak "meters" with > fluency. > > Fortunately, President Obama displayed a willingness to accept the meter as > the preferred unit of distance. > > Unfortunately, many commentators in the news media are not so inclined to > speak the word meter. > > They remain misguided by the Associated Press Style Guide, studiously > avoiding the word meter. > > Watch and listen to the Aware Ceremony, in meters, when it is rebroadcast. > > Eugene Mechtly > >
